[A]fter the Madrid bombings on March 11th 2004, and their startling effect on Spain's election results, Rob knew he had to deal with the issue. Islamic terrorism had come to mainland Europe and contributed to a change in government and that was unquestionably going to affect his characters.

The circumstances seemed apt, for he had a uniquely useful hero. In The Silent and the Damned Javier Falcon had recently traced his ancestry to Morocco and he also lived in a city and region with a glorious Islamic past. Falcon is thus able to act as a bridge between Spanish authorities and a potentially hostile Muslim community. Seville has a unique heritage in this respect that marks it out from other Spanish cities.

"Although separated by the Straits of Gibraltar, the two regions of Southern Spain and Morocco are essentially the same, apart from their religion and some aspects of their culture," Rob explained. "These differences were brought about by the final expulsion of the Moors from Andalucia in 1492 after more than 700 years of occupation but the cultural debt lingers on and it’s why so many people love to go to Seville. It was these particular set of circumstances that led me to change my mind.”

Clearly a great deal of research was required. Reading up was helpful but with such sensitive issues, it was time to do some fieldwork. Rob and his wife, Jane, went to Morocco where he’d used his contacts to set up interviews at a factory. Over the next few days they spoke to a wide range of Moroccans and expats including senior executives, salesmen, factory supervisors, skilled and unskilled workers – even the security guard. Fortunately, they encountered few problems getting people to talk.

“The Moroccans had suffered their own terrorist attack in Casablanca in May 2003 so they were as interested in talking about terrorism as any European,” Rob recalls. In addition, to put them at ease, neither used any kind of recording equipment. This worked well. “They were expansive and revealing. The most striking discoveries were that to a man and woman they were religious, some profoundly, others less so but there was no such thing as an agnostic or an atheist.” This was in stark contrast to Javier’s native Spain, where despite its Catholic history, only an estimated 20% of the population continue to observe the faith.

Meanwhile, Moroccans have a sense of history that to a western mind appears distorted. As Rob puts it, “History [to them] was a living thing, and their view of it was, of course, exclusively Arabic”. Thus, references to the events in the Koran and the 1917 Balfour Agreement are spoken about in the same breath. Similarly, recent events are subject to intensely subjective speculation.

“Some of the Moroccans we spoke to, and they were educated executives, believed that 9/11 was a Mossad operation, which George Bush had sanctioned to discredit the Arab world. They also believed that the invasion of Iraq was masterminded by Ariel Sharon and that he was the commander-in-Chief of the American forces on the ground,” said Rob. He believes he has identified why such theories abound in Islamic society: “Arabs think like this because of a profound emotional engagement in the conflict and a total lack of trust in what Western governments are telling them.”